I bought my gaming PC about 8 years ago, and it was a complete setup from the store since it was cheaper than buying the parts separately. My current specs are a GTX 1070 Armor 8GB GPU, an i5 8600K CPU, and an MSI 370Z motherboard. For storage, I have a 256GB SSD (which feels pretty slow now) and a 1TB HDD. I don't know much about the other hardware. I'm looking to upgrade so that I can play most games smoothly, ideally on medium to high/ultra settings, without needing 4K performance. What do I need to upgrade to avoid any performance issues? Thanks!
3 Answers
You could squeeze a bit more life out of your current setup with a used i7 or i9 if you find one cheap, but the GPU will likely need to be new. An NVMe SSD for faster loading times would help too, and you might consider SATA SSDs configured in RAID 0 for games instead of sticking with the HDD. It's really up to your budget.
Honestly, you'll need to replace the CPU, GPU, motherboard, RAM, and SSD. At that point, you’re basically building a new PC. You might as well just sell the old one and start fresh!
Yeah, I figured that might be the case since the specs are pretty outdated, but I was hopeful things wouldn't be so drastic.
What price could I sell this old rig for?
You'll likely need a whole new computer. The good news is you can keep the 1TB HDD for extra storage. Since Intel has changed CPU sockets, upgrading just your CPU will also mean getting a new motherboard. Plus, with DDR5 RAM becoming standard, you'll need a new motherboard anyway. Just keep in mind that new GPUs require a bit more power, so you might need to update your power supply too. The old 1070 was decent, but a current model like the 5070 would blow it away with features like Ray Tracing and DLSS.
Out of curiosity, how good was my setup back in late 2017? What are considered mid-range specs these days?
What kind of new GPU would pair well with an upper mid-range i5 or i7? I prefer buying new parts.